The Arrival of Eden Joy

Yeah...she is finally here! Eden Joy was born at 7:15pm Friday April 10th at home in the water!

My water broke around 8am on Friday morning. My midwife and doula arrived around noon. I went walking to get things moving. Around 5 things started to pick up. By 6 I was in pretty active intense labor..I got in the tub around that time. God's presence was there the whole time. There were times when I thought I wouldn't be able to get through another contraction and then I would pray and God would give me the strength to keep going. Chris, Angie my doula and Nicole my midwife were great! During one particular hard contraction I said to Chris "pray harder!" I then heard all three of them began to pray! At one point I told God I could only handle two more contractions and two more later I was pushing. I was struggling a little to push her out.. my midwife was expecting that as God had given her a dream of Eden being stuck and showed her how to deliver her. She was going to have me get out of the tub and on my hands and knee's but I flipped over to hands and knee's in the tub and gave a push, her head came with the cord around her neck, my midwife unwrapped it and then I pushed again, her shoulder was stuck a little so my midwife did a little maneuvering and after two more pushes out she came! She was a little floppy at first and it took a minute to get her to breath but just as my midwife was getting ready to intervene she let out a cry..Praise God! Eden and I were helped out of the tub and onto the birthing stool to deliver the placenta. My midwife and doula were amazed with my cord...they said it was such a strong healthy cord that even if it was wrapped around her neck three times she would still be able to get oxygen from it. After I delivered the placenta we let the other kids come down and welcome their new baby sister.

Originally we were going to name her Eden Katriel but a week before she was born God spoke to me and told me that she was going to be bringing so much joy into our lives that we decided to change her middle name to Joy!

I am so pleased with the whole home birth experience..what a difference from being in the hospital. I felt so much peace. My midwife and doula were so loving and supportive. I never felt pressured but relaxed enough to just let my body do what it needed to do.

Our kids were great throughout the whole experience. They played outside watched t.v. etc. They were all upstairs watching Little House on the Prairie when Eden was born...of course they heard her cry and wanted to run down right away but I still needed time to deliver the placenta and get cleaned up. The were fascinated by the birth and helped with the newborn screening. They also asked to see the placenta (everyone but Lauren that is). The boys really enjoyed exploring the placenta and had a whole biology lesson on birth. LOL! The hardest thing now is dealing with them all wanting to hold her all the time. Eden will never be lacking for attention!

Even though I had to wait longer than expected it was well worth it!